Re: EOS 5D Mark III & Third Party Batteries
RustyTheGeek said:
As much as I’d like to bash the record companies, I’m going to have to disagree. People steal music because it’s free and easy.
I think "easy" is probably more significant than "free". At the time when everybody (*) started stealing music, you could buy songs only in CD-sized collections of a dozen songs, half of which were songs you already owned. Most of the reason the music industry is in such bad shape is that they dragged their heels kicking and screaming, trying desperately to maintain that broken business model out of pure greed, ignoring the needs of their customer base, until it was too late. It wasn't just that it was cheap, or that it was easy, but that pirates got a higher quality product (single songs instead of collections) for less money (free)
and more conveniently (downloads instead of physical media).
(*) For some small value of everybody.
IMO, that's actually a pretty good analogy for the way Canon is treating their customers with the whole battery issue. I've been trying to order legitimate Canon batteries from Amazon since I got my 6D back in June or July, and they've been consistently out of stock, with no expected delivery date. And prior to that, according to various reviews, Amazon was apparently selling counterfeit Canon batteries. This from one of Canon's
official distributors.
Before Canon shuts down the third-party manufacturers, they need to fix the serious supply chain problems that make their own batteries so hard to obtain. Canon has far bigger problems than the inflated price of their batteries....
entlassen said:
B&H is including a free Watson brand LP-E6 with all their 5D Mark III bodies & kits (as well as their 6D offerings). Does anyone with the newest 1.2.3 firmware installed on their 5D Mark III who also happens to have one of these Watson batteries know if the battery works? (I'm curious if B&H is sending out a "free battery" that is incompatible with 1.2.3).
They work with my 6D, so they ought to work with the 5DMk3, too.
dstppy said:
I saw "I don't want to pay $100 for a battery" from someone, in a $1700 camera? I don't get it . . . get your camera at the best price possible, then you can afford genuine accessories.
It's not $100 for a battery. It's $400 for four batteries so that you can always have two in your grip, two on the charger, and the one emergency spare that came with your camera. The difference between $100 and $40 isn't much, but the difference between $400 and $160 is half the cost of a 600 EX flash. Given a limited budget, most folks would much rather spend their money on an accessory whose performance is likely to vary significantly between manufacturers, like a flash, rather than on a mere power source.
Also, those batteries are going to get tossed after three or four years when the cells start to fail anyway—even sooner if you're using a device that uses a significant chunk of battery power even when turned off (e.g. anything with GPS)—so you're basically talking about a disposable, consumable item. In other words, the people who don't blow a hundred bucks on a genuine Canon battery are the same people who don't blow four times the price for genuine Kodak paper or genuine Epson inks—that is to say, most people. If these were alkaline batteries, nobody would be surprised when people didn't buy genuine Canon batteries. The fact that the batteries come in packs and are rechargeable a certain number of times doesn't really change things.
unfocused said:
Also wondering if Canon even makes their own batteries. I doubt it. I wouldn't be surprised if Energizer makes them for Canon and it's the same battery. Does Canon really have its own manufacturing facility for all the various permutations of batteries their cameras use?
Like pretty much all electronics manufacturers, they almost certainly manufacture their own battery packs, but buy the cells or bags themselves from Sony or one of the other major battery cell makers. They would never be able to justify the sort of R&D expense needed to build their own cells. It's a fairly mature commodity market with a high barrier to entry.
Joe M said:
Case in point is the use in laptops. Many a recall has been issued over people finding their computers getting pretty hot. And you want to risk your camera doing the same?
Laptop batteries are much bigger than the batteries in cameras, often have less packaging to secure them against impact damage, and are charged while you're using them. IIRC, the overwhelming majority of catastrophic Lithium ion battery failures happen while you're charging them, not when they're idle or in normal use, so that's really not a fair comparison.
Odds are, you're just risking a charger that you can replace for $35.... I mean yes, one could theoretically catch fire while it's in your camera, but I'm pretty sure you're more likely to get struck by lightning on the way to the shoot. Also, your homeowner's or renter's insurance will almost certainly cover fire damage in the highly unlikely even that it does happen.
